dtube and I have seen lots of posts here where members would ask about rebooting the iPhone, restore mode and DFU mode, how to get into this and when to use. We decided to write this up, helping as a reference.

I. Rebooting
Sometimes you iPhone may just hang or not work as expected. If you can’t leave an application to the springboard or can’t start an application from the springboard - reboot the iPhone. Think of it as restarting your Mac or Windows PC.
Reboot: Turn off the iPhone using the red slider and turn it on again.
If this does not help: On the iPhone hold Start/Sleep button and Home button, keep holding it until the Apple Logos shows up. Release both buttons then.

II. Standard Restore/Recovery via iTunes
If rebooting and resetting the iPhones settings does not help, it is time to start from scratch. You restore/recover to the firmware you were using. During the process all data on the iPhone will be erased. In most cases you just connect the iPhone to your Mac/Windows PC, make sure the current version of iTunes is running. iTunes will "see" the iPhone and let you "Restore". To make sure you restore to the firmware you need, download it before to your Mac/PC here.

On Windows shift-click "Restore", on a Mac ctrl-click "Restore". A new window will pop up, select the firmware file you downloaded.



After Restore is complete jailbreak, activate, unlock with iLiberty or Pwnage (Windows and Mac). Connect then to iTunes again to sync music, etc ... iTunes will offer to "use data from a backup" or "setup as a new iPhone". Last option is usually the best. In lots of cases when using the backup option, you might get back preference files that caused the problems. If setup as a new iphone you will lose data like SMS database, call history, Google Bookmarks. Use programs like iPhone PC Suite or PhoneView to backup those before.

III. Restore/Recovery mode manually
In some cases, you screwed up that much, iTunes would not see the iPhone. In this case you have to put the iPhone into Restore/Recovery mode manually.
Option 1: Hold both power and home button at the same time, when the red slider appears, continue to hold. Phone will reboot, when you see the apple icon appears, let go of the power/sleep and continue to hold home. iTunes will detect phone in recovery mode. Note: your phone screen will show the usb cable & CD.
Option 2: If this does not work disconnect iPhone and PC/Mac (iTunes running). Hold Start/Sleep button and Home button until the screen goes black, release both. Press and hold Home button then and connect the iPhone to your Mac/Windows PC, while still holding the Home button. iTunes will pop up a widow telling you the program found an iPhone in recovery mode. Release Home button, click OK in then iTunes window.



IV. Special restore/recovery in DFU mode
iTunes and manual restore/recovery mode only allow to restore/recover to the firmware you are using or to a newer one. You are not able to downgrade to an older firmware. This feature was needed (downgrade) a few month ago and found. It is called DFU mode, not documented by Apple. DFU mode is a special version of restore/recovery mode (above) and has two advantages:
1. DFU mode doesn't boot up the "Mac OS" on the iPhone - therefore it doesn't communicate with iTunes "as much" as in Restore mode and iTunes can't decide to interrupt downgrading the firmware.
2. Even if you want to stay at the current firmware, in some cases it’s better to use DFU mode for restoring. Even less data from the old system (that may have caused trouble) remains on the iPhone after restoring to the new firmware file.
When in DFU mode the procedure for restoring, upgrading or downgrading the firmware is the same as in part II.

Getting the iPhone in DFU mode is a bit tricky if you try this manually:
While iPhone and Mac/PC are connected
1. hold power + home
2. in a few sec, red slider appears, continue holding til phone reboot
3. count to 6
4. let go power
Note: if you see the apple icon appears, you are a little late of letting off the power button. Start over again, make sure you let go of the power button before the apple appears.
5. keep holding home until itunes detects it or if you hear a connection tone (like plugging in a USB device on Windows), let go of home.
Screen should be black all the time beginning at step 3
If iTunes wants to check for "... version on the server..", let it check, after that you will see the Restore button. Shift-click restore (Option-click on Mac) and select the firmware you want to use.

DFU mode is easy to get into with the help of iLiberty (Windows and Mac). Start the Programm and enter DFU mode as shown in the pics. When in DFU mode quit iLiberty and start iTunes.

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If you want to become a Hackint0sh supporter click here
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iPhone 3GS factory unlocked (3.1.2; Blackra1n, Cydia, OpenSSH, custom 3.0 ipcc file (no sig), tethering hack by Dev team, 32 GB)
iPhone 3G (3.0.1; Redsn0w 0.8, Cydia, OpenSSH) 16 GB

I think we may have a lot of questions regarding this matter in the next few days. I will make this a sticky.

Other moderators,
Please add/modify if you see anything wrong with this.

Thanks

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Yeah, in there you misspelled download volkspost. Press Ctrl+F and type in dowmload and you will find it.

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Dears,

I am moderator of the main iPhone forum in Belgium and I have used the DFU hundreds of time before...

Now, I have noticed it is completely impossible to set iPhone in real DFU mode (i.e. blank screen) since itunes 7.7. Indeed, the DFU mode is only finalized when connecting to itunes.

My guess is that apple removed this DFU from the latest itunes because it is now even bypassing the FW validation process!

I did the following to test it out:
- DFU with itunes 7.5 on another computer
- Connect on computer with iTunes 7.7 and restore straight away on an iPhone which was not pwned before with a custom 2.0 firmware...

And it worked!

Could you comment on this and let me know if there are some ways to put it i DFU with itunes 7.7?

Thx,

Calvin

EDIT: I realized this comment was only valid for Windows as you can still put it in DFU on MAC...

Hello Calvin,
Thanks for your message and for visiting us.
We will check it out and post back.

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I beleive that iLiberty can put the phone into DFU MODE...check it out.

__________________
iPhone 1.0.2 OTB->Virginized-> 1.1.4 FW->
winpwn 2.0.0.4 FW 2.0.1 Quickpwn Win XP 2.0.1 to FW 2.2.1 - 2.2.1->redsnOw->3.0 FW
itunes 3.0.1 FW->redsnOw 8 to unlock


Can someone give me a thumbs up click on Reputation ...thanks

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I haven't got my 1st Gen iPhone yet but will have this weekend, when I intend to upgrade to 2.0.1 and then jailbreak, activate and unlock.
I've been reading up what to do and will be using Winpwn.
This is the instructions from dtube on how to enter DFU mode (from another thread:

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DFU:

- connect phone to computer
- shutdown itunes
- turn of phone
- hold power + home for 10 sec
- after 10 sec, release power/sleep and continue holding home
- when hearing the connection tone from the computer, let go of home
- itunes will detect the phone
- screen on phone is black
- shift-click restore with custom 2.0 fw
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Are we now saying this method does not work (re: Calvin's comments) ??

Thanks.

That should work with itunes 7.7 installed on your machine.
I do it many many times and it always work for me

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i really need help. my phone is stuck in recovery mode and i've tried restoring it on itunes, but when i try to restore it says preparing to restore on iphone and it goes for hours. i really don't know anything about the phone, i just got it from my friend and he said he didn't know what happened either. can someone please help? i've tried ibrickr and some other stuff.
thanks.

Make sure to have iTunes 8 installed on your PC/Mac. Connect iPhone and PC/Mac and shut down iPhone by holding start/sleep and Home until the screen goes black, release both buttons immediately.
Quit iTunes if running.
On the iPhone hold Home and start/sleep for 10 seconds (count like 100, 200, 300,...)
Release stsrt/sleep BUT keep holding home...
...keep holding it until iTunes starts up and finds an iPhone in recovery mode.
The iPhone's screen should be black all the time, the iPhone then is in DFU mode.
In iTunes hit restore to restore the iPhone to Apple firmware 2.1

Goto Quickpwn section in the forum then and check it out. Use Quickpwn to jailbreak/activate/unlock the iPhone

__________________
Read the stickies and search the forum before posting!
If you want to become a Hackint0sh supporter click here
----------
iPhone 3GS factory unlocked (3.1.2; Blackra1n, Cydia, OpenSSH, custom 3.0 ipcc file (no sig), tethering hack by Dev team, 32 GB)
iPhone 3G (3.0.1; Redsn0w 0.8, Cydia, OpenSSH) 16 GB